According to Sergei Lemberg, lemon law attorney and principal of Lemberg Law, the LLI is based on information extracted from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) database.

"The database includes consumer complaints, defect investigations, manufacturer technical service bulletins, and recall campaigns," Lemberg said. "We cross-referenced the number of vehicles sold and the NHTSA data to develop an index to determine which makes and models of vehicles are most likely to be lemons."

Lemberg noted that the LLI methodology first involved determining the ratio of NHTSA complaints to the number of units sold.

"We considered the 2014 passenger cars, pickup trucks, and SUVs that were among the 280 top-selling vehicles in the U.S., and that sold more than 10,000 units," he said.

Next, vehicles were scored according to the number of Technical Service Bulletins (TSBs) issued for each model.

"TSBs issued by the manufacturer can serve to alert dealerships to defects, meaning that cars can be repaired prior to the consumer lodging a complaint," Lemberg said. Because TSBs are unrelated to the number of units sold and because the NHTSA underrepresents the number of consumer complaints, the Lemberg Lemon Index weights TSBs more heavily than consumer complaints.

"To determine overall which 2014 vehicles were most likely to be lemons, we compared the consumer complaint index, the TSB index, and the LLI index," said Lemberg. "There are six models that appear on all three lists, and are thus most likely to be lemons."

Lemberg noted that, given the sheer number of components of modern vehicles, defects are bound to happen.

"Buying a car is the second biggest expenditure most people will make, after buying a house," he said. "The government has a duty to alert consumers to defects, and car manufacturers must be held accountable when defects aren't repaired."

About Lemberg Law
The attorneys at Lemberg Law represent consumers in lemon law, Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, and Telephone Consumer Protection Act cases, among others. Sergei Lemberg can brief you about state lemon laws and remedies available to consumers who have defective vehicles.